All in a Day’s Work: A Look at the Job of Massachusetts Registrar of Motor Vehicles
April 29, 2009
If your interaction with the Registry of Motor Vehicles is limited to renewing your license (if you can remember when it expires and don’t have to go through the embarrassing hassle of an arrest for unwittingly driving with an expired one), you can’t be faulted for not knowing what our state’s Registrar of Motor Vehicles, Rachel Kaprielian, does every day.
Although NAGE did not participate in any kind of job shadowing, we were able to discover quite a bit about Kaprielian’s job just through keen observation and by reading one member’s mail.
For example, in the May 2009 edition of AAA’s newspaper, Horizons, a photo of Kaprielian appears on the front page (lead story, above the fold)—she is standing next to AAA Southern New England President Mark Shaw, and they jointly are announcing Kaprielian’s new Registry program that ships jobs and money to Rhode Island (that’s where AAA Southern New England is headquartered). In the story, which describes Kaprielian’s program of allowing AAA members to renew their licenses and vehicle registrations at AAA offices in Newton and Worcester, Kaprielian proudly calls the program “… a win for AAA’s members.” She would have been more honest and accurate to describe it as a win for Rhode Island and for AAA, the company. (And good luck to you if you’re not a AAA member, the “win” for you is longer lines at the RMV when Kaprielian reduces staff as she passes jobs along to AAA.)
When Kaprielian’s not busy posing for pictures with corporate America, she spends time at the State House lobbying lawmakers on behalf of legislation that will allow her to legalize the AAA contract that she’s already implemented.
And when she finds time between her lobbying gig and promoting AAA, she volunteers.
About two hours each week, Kaprielian works for the Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation, a presumably worthy organization that is best known for its generous compensation of administrative staff. Of the $7.8 million the foundation spends each year from health insurance premiums paid to its parent, close to 40 percent goes to administration costs. That includes a hefty supposed $300,000 salary to the foundation’s executive director, Jarrett Barrios, whose recent past includes a stint as a state senator.
So that’s a brief sketch of what our Registrar of Motor Vehicles has been up to lately. Not a bad job if you can get it.